The Moon Chose Her

Martha began her usual performance.

She slapped her thighs.

She clutched her chest.

She cursed the ancestors for giving her such a disobedient daughter-in-law.

Then came the line I had been waiting for.

“I won’t live anymore!”

She spun her wheelchair-bound dramatics into a full sprint toward the door.

Well, not wheelchair-bound yet.

That came later.

In my first life, I had panicked.

This time, I lay still.

Ethan chased after her.

I did not.

Through the bedroom window, I watched Martha rush toward the street.

She kept looking back at the building entrance.

Waiting for me.

Waiting for the bleeding woman with fresh stitches to stumble after her.

No one came.

Martha slowed.

For the first time, she seemed unsure what to do.

If she stopped, she would lose face.

If she actually ran into traffic, she might get hurt.

So she chose the smallest possible drama.

She threw herself toward a slow three-wheeled delivery cart near the curb.

Unfortunately, the driver was drunk.

The cart swerved.

The wheel rolled over Martha’s leg.

Her scream reached the third floor.

I leaned back against the pillow and closed my eyes.

Not dead.

But acceptable.

Martha returned from the hospital with a fractured leg and a cast thick enough to humble a bull.

Ethan blamed me.

“Why provoke her?” he snapped after helping her into bed.

I looked at him.

“Did I push her?”

“You know how she is.”

There it was again.

The family scripture.

My mother is like this.

She cannot change.

You should endure.

Martha spent the next few days sitting in her room, crying loudly enough for the neighbors to hear.

“My life is cursed. My son married a cruel woman.”

Ethan left for work every morning and returned late.

The house held only Martha, me, my newborn, and the suffocating smell of resentment.

I sent my older son to my parents.

Without him, Martha could not even get a glass of water unless I chose to give it to her.

Still, she did not stop.

“You should have a daughter.”

“Girls cost less.”

“When she grows up, we can get a fine mating dowry.”

“Your sons will thank you.”

That afternoon, I placed my sleeping baby in his crib and walked to Martha’s doorway.

She sat in bed, staring at the water dispenser just out of reach, licking her dry lips.

“Water,” she ordered.

I looked at her.

Then I bit my finger.

Blood welled at the tip.

The room cooled.

Moonlight slid across the floor though it was still afternoon.

Martha frowned.

“What are you doing?”

I whispered her name in my heart.

Martha Hale.

The air tightened.

The old woman’s voice rose again, soft as burial soil.

“Named.”

Martha shifted uneasily.

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

The moonlight touched her belly.

“Chosen.”

My blood burned.

“Carried.”

The pressure vanished.

I smiled.

Martha glared.

“Are you insane? Get me water.”

I poured a cup and handed it to her.

She drank greedily.

I sat beside her bed, gentle as a devoted daughter-in-law.

“Mom, your leg checkup is tomorrow, right?”

“So?”

“I booked you a full physical exam too.”

She narrowed her eyes.

“You? This kind?”

I shrugged.

“You’re over fifty. People your age should be checked once a year.”

“Why would you care?”

“I don’t,” I said. “I just don’t want you to get sick and spend our money.”

The next morning, Martha called Ethan and me to the hospital before I was even fully awake.

By the time we arrived, she was standing in the examination room waving a report in the doctor’s face.

“How dare you say I’m pregnant?”

The doctor adjusted his glasses.

“The ultrasound clearly shows a gestational sac.”

“That’s impossible!” Martha shrieked. “My husband has been dead for years!”

The doctor’s eyes moved over her.

“I can only speak from the medical results.”

“I’m almost menopausal!”

“Theoretically, as long as menopause is not complete, pregnancy remains possible.”

Martha looked like she might faint.

Ethan looked like his soul had left his body.

I stood behind them and lowered my head.

Not because I was sad.

Because I was trying not to laugh.

On the drive home, no one spoke.

Martha clutched the report like it was a death sentence.

Ethan gripped the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles turned white.

I looked out the window at the pale daytime moon.

A womb for a womb.

The Moon Mother kept her promises.